Running Totals Example In Power BI Using DAX Formula

Sometimes calculating running totals is a far better away to analyse trends than just looking at actual results on a daily basis.

So that’s why I’m going to show you in this example how you can implement a running total calculation which is dynamic, which flows and integrates well into the rest of your model.

And I’m going to show you how you can do it very effectively and easily by combining a few DAX measures inside of Power BI.

When you implement this technique, there’s so many different things that you can actually branch into as well. So not only can you look at, say, running totals at any point in time, you can actually compare your running totals versus last month, last quarter, or last year as well.

You can really branch out into any calculation or pattern of DAX formula that you would likely also use over you standard actual results.

I think that running totals are a much better way to look at averages over time, trends over time, or divergence of trends over time. Sometimes it’s too granular at a daily level, and with running totals, you just have more of an averaging like fit that allows you to not get caught up in any one individual result, but you’re actually looking at an accumulation of results that actually provide much better insights.

Lots of different ways that you can utilize this in Power BI, and certainly you’re getting a much better idea of how I personally implement it via the video.

I go into quite a bit of detail around the specific formula, but then also how you can branch out from it for other insights that you might ultimately want to create.

So good luck implementing this one. Lots to learn and lots to replicate in your own models.